


Temporary Scientist

by Kaydalen



Series: A lawyer, a mother - A survivor, a lover [3]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Angst and Feels, Contains Story Spoilers, Drama, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-16
Updated: 2016-01-22
Packaged: 2018-05-14 05:47:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5731672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaydalen/pseuds/Kaydalen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grace is back from the Institute and set on the idea to join and change the 'Father's plans for the Commonwealth. She wants to do it without getting Piper into this mess, but her girlfriend interprets her silence and weird behavior as something completely different and now the Vault Dweller has more than one problem to deal with.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Piper was quiet after she told her.

The reporter was restlessly pacing inside her companions old house in Sanctuary for over a minute now. They were here to talk, to sort things out, but none of them could get it started. Maybe it was a bad idea, because all the memories were haunting these walls like ghosts so that the Vault Dweller could barely stand it. But no settler would barge in like that, no Preston, no one. 

Grace could literally see Piper thinking. How her lips parted, mouthing words she didn't speak out loud, fumbling on the sleeves of her coat, before turning back to her.  
The worry and relief in her eyes, the terrified expression from earlier, were gone and had been replaced by outrage, by furry.  
Grace took a deep breath, a step back, her mind blank. She had never seen her like that. Her heels hit the couch. 

“I can't believe you're actually doing this”, Piper whispered and it made her feel worse than having to hear her shout, “You know what the Institute is doing to the Commonwealth, you know what they did to your son, you ..”  
“I know it”, Grace cut her off, growling, stretched the first word, spoke it loud and clear, reminded her that she had been the one infiltrating the Institute and not her, “But you don't, Piper, you don't know anything!”  
She watched the reporters shoulders drop, how her body became less tense. She was sure she had to feel some kind of guilt now, barking at her like that, but she didn't. Everything felt numb. The reporter gritting her teeth, wearing a pained expression, her clenching her fists, opening them again and bringing her hands to her face to cover it for a brief moment; All of it did nothing to her. 

“Then explain it to me, Blue, please.”

Her voice was still low, but it was trembling, hoarse, on the edge of tears. Rage, Sadness, Disappointment. Could have been all of it and nothing, Grace wasn't that sure, everything was spinning and heat gushed up to her face.  
She wanted her to shout, to rage, to be furiously disappointed, to shake her and tell her that what she did was utterly wrong and it would have felt right, but that wasn't how Piper worked. Grace loved and hated her for it at the same time.

It was her family she was trying to save and that didn't include telling Piper her son was the leader of the Institute. She just couldn't. The reporter hated the Institute, but Shaun wasn't a bad guy. He tried to do good or so she was trying to convince herself with a lump in her throat. She didn't want to give him a bad name, he didn't deserve that kind of attention. He was her boy, she could change his mind, make him see.  
But she couldn't have Piper around for that. Even if the thought of leaving her for now hurt, she had to think of herself for once. And her family. Something inside of her was clinging on that thought, that concept, that idea. Family meant peace, family was something she recognized from the world before the war, maybe the only thing left. It was comforting to think about.

“I can't, Piper.”  
“You are not you, what happened in there?”  
The reporter raised her voice, stepped closer and immediately Grace tried to move farther away, but she held onto her arm.  
“I am still me, I haven't changed.”  
“Blue, you just told me, you joined the Institute!”, Piper blurted out, now not that controlled anymore, “It's like you- “  
She cut herself off, her eyes widened, her mouth stood open and the grip on her arm tightened. Time stood still, Grace could hear her take a deep shaky breath before she continued. 

“You're .. Are you a Synth?”

Whatever Grace was expecting her to say, it was not that. It was like her touch was sending bolts through her body and there was this sudden desire to shake her off, but that probably wasn't such a smart thing to do considering the ridiculous assumption her companion just had made.  
“What, no!”, Grace defended herself, “Of course I'm not a Synth, but I just .. trust me with this, alright?”

But Piper wasn't convinced. It was like she couldn't get this thought out of her head that the person before her was not who she claimed to be. Seemed to have found the solution to her lovers strange, unusual behavior. They had cursed and haunted and fought the Institute for months and now she just joined them? Had they brainwashed her into this small amount of time?  
For a terrifying moment there was this thick silence hanging over them, covering them like a blanket, muffling sounds, voices, thoughts. Grace broke out in cold sweat. The situation was tense, not like it usual was. The trust was gone, the comfortable feeling that drew a smile to her face was gone, the warmth and maybe, just maybe, the love – she desperately hoped it wasn't. Instead she was at a loss for words and didn't find herself able to do more than gently stroking the hand on her arm. It was cold.

Then she pulled away.

“Prove it.”  
Piper was hissing and before the Vault Dweller could do anything else she felt the barrel of a gun underneath her chin.  
Out of an instinct Grace rapidly raised her arms in defense.  
“Whoa, put the gun down, Pipes!”  
“Prove to me .. you're not a Synth!”  
Suddenly the reporters voice was thick with tears, nearly swallowed the last word.  
“I don't know what they did to her down there, they may .. you may .. your kind may have killed and replaced her and that's why you're acting like that now, you're not the Blue I know .. and, you know, love.”

Pipers body was shaking, a stern expression on her face though her eyes constantly filling with tears. The more she started to believe her own thoughts the more it hurt her. She didn't mean to inflict this into her, this must have been something like her worse nightmare coming true.  
Grace's head was empty. The talks they had, the moments they shared, everything that would have been intimate enough to convince her she wasn't a imposter was just gone. Behind a thick fog of emotions this situation had brought up, no way of digging through it and it was getting rapidly darker – in and around her.

“Piper, I- “

“Prove it!”, Piper sobbed, tears painting marks on her cheeks, her nose turning red. She wanted to kiss and hold her and tell her everything was fine but she didn't even find the courage to touch her. Like she could crumpled and fall apart under her fingertips.  
The Vault Dweller opened her mouth but no words found the way over her tongue, were stuck in her throat and still feeling the cool barrel of the gun on her skin started to freak her out, make her paranoid, even if Piper was the one holding it. She seemed emotional unstable, not able to think straight, convinced of her being a Synth, so buried in the fear the whole Commonwealth had that she didn't even believe her own girlfriend. 

This wasn't how she had planed this to went out at all.

Preston couldn't have chosen a worse moment to barge in. Maybe he heard them, maybe he was worried about them being in here for so long after the tense talk they had outside, maybe he just wanted to inform her about another settlement being in trouble – again.  
As soon as Pipers eyes fell on him she backed off immediately, like she burned herself, her gun still ready, but she didn't release a shot. Grace could have sworn to see a flicker of doubt in her eyes despite what she said, but when she reached out to her she pushed her away.

“Get out, Synth. Be glad I let you live.”

She wasn't convinced. She was struggling with herself. If she would have been completely sure about her being a Synth she would be dead right now.  
Though her voice was as cold as ice, her eyes red from crying.

Their eyes locked one last time. Grace resisted the urge to pull her into a hug.

“What is going on here? General?”

Grace didn't answer. She didn't take any supplies, she didn't dare to stay any longer. She had to stick to her original plan, there was nothing she could do about Piper right now. She would feel bad about this decision later, when the emotions cooled off, when the fog was gone, but not now. She would miss her.

She had to go back to the Institute, back to her son and she had to figure out what exactly was going on, how she could help this fraction hidden for years under their feet finally cooperate with the rest of the Commonwealth. Had to figure out how to reach out to her son without accidentally driving him even further away, changing his ideas about saving the people.  
Her mind was set on this, this had been the only thing she could think about since she had seen her son again after all this time. He was so old, there wasn't much time left.

“General!”

Prestons voice followed her out when she left with big, confident steps, eyes forward, not looking back.

Pipers wasn't.


	2. Chapter 2

Shaun didn't even seem surprised to see her. 

He was just cracking a self confident smile and led Grace to meet his scientists, to show her what he had build during the years she was still in the cryo. It was impressive and terrifying at the same time. The scientists didn't trust her and didn't tell her more than necessary, most of the time they let her watch while they constructed bodies, programmed minds and build humans they thought this world needed. That was what she learned.

They didn't intend to save the people above, they intended to replace them. Mankind redefined. Stronger, smarter, faster, resistant to radiation and any other kind of illness able to struck down every other human being. The basic idea wasn't too bad, but the way they forced their experiments on the Commonwealth was problematic. They didn't see it. They had been down here for too long to realize what friendship, love, family and bounds between humans in general meant. They tried to fake it with chems and programs, but it wasn't the real thing. 

This was Shauns plan. He had come so far, made his machines move and act like the scientists building them, but there were parts in the brain that were still an unknown. Without this important feature friends, lovers and family would be able to tell in an instant if an individual had been replaced by just studying their eyes, their expressions.

And that problem he wanted the Vault Dweller to solve. 

They wanted Grace to test it. The first stranger to ever walk free around the Institute. The only person who still knew how these bounds had to feel. How you had to react to certain situations, to certain emotions to make it look real.

As she stood in front of one of them, the Synth constructed after a captured Settler begging to set him free and looked into his eyes through the bars caging him, they were empty. They mirrored the white light of the cold and clean lab, but didn't express the joy the scientists had intended to simulate.  
Grace shook his head and the Synth lowered his upper half, collapsed, as they shut him down.  
An error. A mistake. They would trash him later.

The Vault Dweller averted her gaze, acted like it didn't faze her and turned around to her son. This old man who already needed a walking crane to keep himself on his feet. He had her eyes. Nates nose. But she didn't recognize his other features. Always a stern expression, barely smiled, his voice deep. It was like the Institute took away what made him part of his family and made him their own. 

“You can see he's a Synth”, Grace told him, tried to shut out the Settlers cries, the sobbing, the begging to let him go, that he had a family to take care of, “His expressions are .. empty. Not real. You could never fool a friend of family member with that.”  
“Any suggestions on how to fix it?”  
Again the Vault Dweller shook her head. She did have ideas in fact, theories, but she didn't want to share them. She was here to change his mind, to help mankind instead of replacing them, but she had to take small steps. If she tried to talk him out of his bullshit, he would become suspicious and not trust her anymore, he wouldn't talk about his plans and she couldn't share her own.  
She had to act like she was fine with what was happening.  
She had to act like she was really one of them.

It hurt. It was hard. She missed Piper and her other friends and companions to death, but she couldn't back off yet.  
She was positive she could save him. Her little boy.  
What he did was wrong. Replacing mankind. He should save them instead, even if they had suffered radiation damage and would never be like the people before the war, they all were worth saving.  
But the Institute didn't see it.  
They were like their own Vault. Didn't know anything about the world above ground. Even if the Father had told them to treat Grace, his mother, like one of them they preferred it to handle her with care and avoid working with her if possible.

She sat alone during lunch, worked on her studies at a desk in a lonely corner of the lab on her own and didn't have any social contact with anyone expect with her son.  
It ate her up from the inside. She lost the feeling for the time. She had to be here for days now. Maybe weeks, months. Nighttime came, but she barely put herself to rest. Even then she collected data, worked on plans, observed Synths and prisoners. It was hard to separate the times of the day. 

It was always bright down here.  
Someone was always at work, during the night or the day.  
She always had to watch the clocks to make sure what time it was. At first they had simulation of day and night, so Shaun had told her, but the people were more productive if it was always day. No one would feel the need to go to sleep when nighttime came around and instead would just sleep if they considered it necessary, if their bodies told them to.  
At one point the Vault Dweller forgot if it was 3 o'clock in the afternoon or the middle of the night and since then she stopped wrapping her head around it like everyone else and just accepted it.

Grace's first chance to turn her sons mind around came when he invited her to a special meeting with him and the leading scientists. He wanted her opinion on how to have greater impact on the Commonwealth.  
Soon they all were sitting together in an oval room, on the head of the table the Father, his fingers intertwined, his cold gaze danced over the attendees of the conference. Grace had taken a seat right beside him, noticed the others staring at her in disapproval. She felt bad, like she didn't belong, like everyone was judging her. She had refused to dress like them, so she still wore her Vault Suit, even if Shaun had insisted that she washed it, so the dirt and the blood and the radiation and stains and hints from the Commonwealth were all gone. Somehow it fit the atmosphere of the Institute with his now bright colors. She still stood out, as everyone else was wearing the white and stainless lab coats. Sterile. Unfriendly. Cold.

“We need more influence in the Commonwealth.”  
Shaun came right to the point and leaned forward.  
“The Gen 3 Synths are not good enough.”  
He definitely sounded upset, gritted his teeth, like it was their fault their research about the emotional expressions didn't go as well as he had planned.  
“While we're working on that, we need other ways to expand our influence. Any ideas?”

Everyone was quiet. The silence hung over them like a thick blanket.  
Everything they knew about the world above ground was through Synths, Coursers, Reports. Their methods had always been killing, kidnapping, replacing.  
But a lot of their spies had been exposed. The Railroad did play a great part in that. The people had become cautious and that was a problem.  
This was Grace's chance to lead them in another direction.

“What you need is not more influence”, she said.  
“What do you know?”, a female scientist hissed. She had never liked her. She was a bitch.  
“Let her talk, Irene”, Shaun scolded her, “It's your fault our Synths are an emotionless bunch, your incompetence. And as long as you don't have a better idea, we hear her out.”  
She didn't answer. Her lips turned into a slim line, she furrowed her brows.  
“That's what I thought.”

Grace took a deep breath. It was a first step that he would listen to her. Still she didn't know how he would react to what she had in mind. It was completely different than how they decided to approach the people above ground so far.  
“You don't need more influence, you need trust”, the Vault Dweller explained, avoided looking one of them in the eyes and acted like she was talking to a non visible person on the only empty chair on the other side of the table.  
“People are not trusting each other anymore and they're surely not trusting you. Synths are hunted, smashed, manipulated to give them their own memories instead of the ones you programmed into them. So that they become individuals and are not replacing people. You're loosing control and not gaining control.”

“We don't want control, we're saving the human race!”  
Grace didn't care to answer. They were too set on their own ideals. They were using manipulation and control to destroy the human race instead of saving them but she didn't dare to tell them that.  
“What you need is to make people trust you. They don't want to be saved, they want to survive!”  
The Vault Dweller had to raise her voice at her last sentence as hell broke loose. Everyone was suddenly talking at once; Shouting, complaining, calling her crazy, that it was a mistake to let her in.  
“You need to help them survive and that's what your Synths can do!”

They didn't even listen to her anymore. They were too busy hearing themselves talk, so she turned her head to Shaun who was studying her with an empty expression.  
“You have more than enough food down here”, she told him, “Radiation free. These people could use that. They need that. You can set up supply chains. You don't have to expose yourself to be the Institute just then. As soon as they realize the food is good and not poisoned and they're trusting you, you can tell them.”

Too be honest, she didn't know if it would be that easy. If it really would work like that. But if they were busy following her plan, they would stop replacing people and maybe realize how wrong it was. They could learn about the people up there, trade and live with them in peace, finally co exist without wanting to kill each other. That was everything she wanted.  
“Then you have your influence”, Grace continued, still more talking to her son than the other people participating in this meeting, “Yes, it could take a while, but it's better than .. killing people all the time. The food you have down here is good. Easy to grow. Even if you charged just a handful of caps you could make a fortune. There are a lot of people up there you would practically die for clean water and food.”  
Grace reached out to her son, but as soon as her hand touched his he pulled away. It was like someone was stabbing her in the chest, but she gulped down her sadness.  
“Please. Think about it. There can finally be peace.”

“That was what she had in mind in the first place!”, one of the scientists, an old bald man, decided to comment on her plan, “She's a spy, she doesn't want to construct the perfect human! Father, she doesn't belong here, this is madness!”  
Shaun didn't shout. He was never loud, he was gaining respect just by his charisma and endless patience. That was a feature he had from his mother. Not the never shouting thing, but the patience. Nate had always told her that. A patience of a saint.  
Again he intertwined his fingers and just stared them down silently. One after another shut their mouth. The volume went down, but there was still this distant hum, like on the inside of a beehive. 

“Any other ideas?”  
The Father could have hit his mother with a brick and it would have had the same effect. She was devastated. It was like he hadn't even listened to her.  
“But ..!”  
“Any other ideas?”, he repeated himself, found everyone staring at him.  
Grace just gritted her teeth and clenched her fists, watched her knuckles turn white.

“The mayor of Diamond City is one of our people, but there are still too many with too much influence who don't belong to us”, the female scientist who had cut off the Vault Dweller in the beginning was sharing her own thoughts now, “There are a few we could replace, because they don't have many family or friends who could recognize that they're not them anymore.”  
This was going horribly wrong and there was nothing Grace could do. She broke out in cold sweat and her body was shaking with anger and fear, which clouded her mind.  
“Who?”, Shaun wanted to know. She couldn't believe he was really considering this.  
“Actually”, she suddenly seemed a bit uncomfortable, “we have already captured one of them.”

Silence.

“You did what?”, Shaun growled, “I thought we talked about this; No more capturing until the Gen 4 Synths are ready!”  
“I know, I know, listen, Father, please”, she begged, her cheeks turning red in excitement, she cracked a smile, “I have talked about it with the Mayor of Diamond City. She barely has family, no friends. She runs a newspaper, spreading lies about the Institute.”  
All the colours drained from Grace's face in an instant. This sounded way too familiar to be true. 

“No ..”  
“If we replace her, we can spread our own true. The people trust this newspaper. It just a small step, but it's a start. She's been a problem for our spies for a long time now too. We can kill two birds with one stone. As soon Diamond City is under our control, we can easily expand.”  
“Where is she?”  
The words were stuck in Grace's throat, everything was spinning, she couldn't think straight. When did she get up from her chair? Why was she suddenly standing up?

“I don't think this is any of your concern, outsider, watch your tone.”  
“Where is she?!”  
This couldn't be true. This couldn't be true.  
“Take me to her, I want to see.”

Shaun was on his feet now too, grabbed his walking crane. Clearly angry. He didn't approve. This could be to Grace's advantage, maybe they would let her go.  
She didn't know if she could face her now, not after the way they separated. Her heart was pounding, her throat dry as the scientist left the room followed by the Father and a desperate Grace.  
They passed labs and closed doors and stairways and the closer they came to the cells the more the Vault Dweller nearly tripped over her own feet.  
The scientist couldn't stop talking, but she didn't catch the meaning of her words.  
Shaun was quiet. He was always quiet.  
They didn't even need to open the door for Grace to hear her.  
A voice. Constantly complaining and swearing, a sob caught in a throat.

The scientist pushed the button besides the door and revealed countless cells along the walls. A handful of them contained people. Snatched away from coursers from above ground and brought here to make perfect copies. Grace never questioned what exactly happened to them after they were done with them, but she was sure it wasn't good.  
“There she is. Piper Wright, the reporter from Publick Occurences”, the scientist explained, pointing to a cell to their left, “The Courser said she put up quiet a fight.”

“Oh, I swear, as soon as I get out of here ..!”  
Pipers voice drew a whimper from Grace's throat.  
She rattled on the bars caging her. She wore a black eye, bruises on her knuckles and blood was oozing from her nose. They had stripped her off the weapons from her belt, her hat was missing. By the looks of it she had thrown it off in frustration.  
Still she had been crying. She couldn't hide her red eyes.

“Piper.”

As soon as she heard this familiar voice calling her name she stopped cursing at the Coursers guarding her and turned her attention to the door.  
Time stopped. The volume of the noises went down.  
Everyone was staring at them.  
Grace took a step forward.  
Piper grimaced.  
Disgust.

And spit out in front of her feet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sorry about the way this is going, this is just too much fun


	3. Chapter 3

Piper refused to talk to her at first.

It didn't matter how much Grace begged and how many times the words got stuck in her throat, how often she choked a sob; Her girlfriend just stepped away from the bars to her prison and moved as close to the wall as possible, eying her with a suspicious look.

She had made a mistake. A huge mistake. And just now she had to deal with the hard consequences. The undeniable fact that she was treating her like her enemy hit her with the force of a Deathclaw attack.  
Maybe she still believed she was dealing with a Synth, that the real person was locked up here somewhere. Maybe she thought Grace was involved in her kidnapping. She didn't want this to happen, everything was out of control, nothing went as planned, nothing was like how she had expected it. Why did they have to choose Piper? Why her of all people?  
She couldn't shake off this feeling this had been Shauns plan all along, even if his reaction before had actually been pretty believable.

“I'm sorry ..”

“Oh hell, no, 'I'm sorry' isn't going to cut it, Grace.”

In an instinct the Vault Dweller let go of the bars of the reporters prison like they had burned off the flesh off her palms, sucked the air through her teeth.  
Piper had called her 'Grace'. She had never called her that before. It had been Blue or Doll or another sweet nickname, but never her first name. This was bad. This was really, really bad.

“You were gone for MONTHS. You left me out there to DIE.”  
Piper barked and clenched her fists, her expression beyond anything she had ever seen on her.  
Grace opened her mouth but no clever words found the way over her tongue. Everything she could do was repeating apologies over and over again.  
Apologies which were just empty words for the hurt and betrayed woman.

“Why am I even talking to you? I still don't know if you're just a Synth or not. The real Grace would never do this to us. To me.”  
“I didn't want this to happen, you have to believe me.”  
Her voice cracked while she repeated herself like a broken record player.  
“I'm not talking to you anymore, just .. go. Leave me alone. I don't have anything to say to you anymore.”

Please don't say it, please don't say these words. Silently the Vault Dweller begged and hoped there was still some of the love left they had, but when their eyes connected and she took a look into these dark eyes, which had lost all their warmth, she knew what she going to say.

“We're through.” 

She tried to hide how her breath hitched in her throat, but she could still read her like a book. Her bruises and all the blood painted a terribly miserable picture of the usual cheerful reporter.

“I'm done with you.”

There were no tears coming. Grace felt horribly empty, her body numb when she stepped back, bumped against her sons chest, suddenly realized how intimidatingly tall he was compared to her.  
“How heartwarming”, the scientist leading them here commented with a creepily satisfying grin.  
“Now now, Irene, mind your words”, Shaun scolded her and patted his mothers shoulder reassuringly, like he was the parent and the tiny woman in front of him his daughter experiencing her first heartbreak.  
His hand was heavy.

“Prepare the subject for the process.”  
“No, please!”, Grace whimpered, clutched the Fathers hand and nearly got to her knees in front of him, so much they were shaking, ready to give away underneath her. She needed something to hold onto, physically and emotionally or she would break down and lose her mind.  
“Don't do this to her, not her!”  
“I believe we had a deal.” Shauns voice was quiet and calm, like it had been in the hallway, like it had been during the conference, like it had been while he watched his scientists and Synths slaughter innocent people they had decided to replace, like it had been when he was talking to her and like it was when he first met her. 

He tilted his head.  
“You are here to construct the Gen 4 Synths, nothing more or less. You're not in the position to make demands.”  
The way he looked down on her made her shiver. She had to choke down a defense. She had to choke down that this wasn't what she did had in mind in the first place, it would just make everything even worse.  
She had to choke down her own pride.

“Know your place and do your job. Complain if you want, refuse my orders if you must, but don't get in my way.”  
He didn't show any signs of emotion. He didn't care about the individuals around him. He lived for the Institute, he lived for his cause and he didn't care about the people the ran over on his way to success.  
Grace didn't want to see it. She had thought he could bring him to his senses, that she could save him. But he was never hers to save. He didn't want to be saved. He believed his own words, believed in his own truth and everyone who didn't was just a barricade, ballast, meant to be cut loose as soon as possible.

“Shaun, please”, Grace gasped, gulped down her tears, didn't want to cry in front of him. She bit down on her lip until it started bleeding to avoid it. It was pathetic how she had to eat humble pie in order to get him to leave Piper alone. Even if the reporter didn't want to have anything to do with her anymore, it didn't mean she wanted her to get hurt. 

She still loved her.

“I'll do anything, but just don't hurt her. Let her leave, she doesn't have anything to do with this.”  
The Vault Dweller didn't even realize herself dropping to her knees. Her sons silhouette grew bigger and more intimidating. He was clearly enjoying the way she lost her mind like that.  
“You heard Irene”, Shaun answered her with his soothing voice, cracked a smile, didn't even bother helping her back up to her feet, “We replace her and we get much more influence in the Commonwealth. I believe we're working towards a common goal, aren't we? Isn't that what you had in mind with your plans you presented to me?”  
“I never agreed to this.”  
Grace buried her face in her hands and broke the eye contact. She lost.

“You didn't complain when our scientists cut up these Settlers.”  
She shook her head and tried to block him out. But she didn't manage to block out the other prisoners protests, their cries. They knew they would meet the same fate.  
She didn't want to hear it. She knew what had happened, what she had done to get her son back and he had been playing her the whole time, just to use it against her now.  
“Don't say that ..”  
“You've sold your own moral, you can't deny that.”  
She wanted him to shut up. She would have given everything to stop him from talking.  
“As long as it doesn't affect yourself, you don't care. That's why I thought you'd make a perfect asset for our team. We need this .. selfishness. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to do this work with such .. perfection.”

He was sick. 

“Creating the perfect human is messy business.”  
The Vault Dweller would never understand how he could talk about slaughtering people with this calm voice, with this seriousness.  
He treated them them like toys. But human beings couldn't be put back together just like that. Maybe there was the influence showing the Institute had on him while he was still a kid. Who knew how they had him spending his time.

“But you were perfect for the job. We thought you were ready. But if you're not ready to sacrifice your own you're worthless for our cause.”  
She held her breath.  
“It was a mistake to let you in.”  
You are worthless. It was a mistake. You are a mistake.  
The weight of these words threatened to crush her. She felt dizzy. She felt sick. It suddenly seemed like the right decision to empty her stomach right on his clean shoes, but she stopped herself from creating such a mess.

“I never wanted this to happen, I never wanted this to happen.”  
Grace repeated this words over and over again, rocking back and forth. There were still no tears on her cheeks, even if she felt them burning in her eyes. He was right. He was right about everything and it was like he was cutting her open with a hot knife presenting her the truth like that.  
“Look at how pathetic you are. You're not the right one for this. Get her out of my sight.”  
The Father had dropped his facade and it was worse than Grace had imagined.

When she noticed him leave she tried to stumble back up to her feet, failed to fight off the Coursers who were about to lead her out with a strong grip, but managed to collect some of her lost sanity.  
“Promise you'll let Piper go!”  
She didn't want to get her into this mess. This was the reason she didn't tell her anything about her plan in the first place.  
It was something between her and her son. 

At first Grace thought he wouldn't even react. He was nearly out of the door, the scientist, clearly satisfied with herself, right besides him, tapping a rhythm with her heel on the clean floor along with the dull 'clonck' of the Fathers walking crane.  
Like it had all been part of her plan.  
But the Father stopped and turned his head.  
“Why would I want to do that?”  
Grace shot Piper a quick glance. Her face was hard to read now after she witnessed this whole conversation. She clenched her teeth, denied herself making any noises, her eyes still red from crying – or again? She couldn't tell, her own sight was blurry.

“Because .. I can give you something in exchange. Something valuable”  
It was the first time she probably saw something like an emotion on his face. Surprise.  
He raised his brows.  
“I'm listening.”

It was risky. She had to try it. She didn't know if she even trusted herself with this, but it was her only chance to get them both out of here, because her son wouldn't let them go just like that anymore.  
She didn't trust her own voice, didn't trust the sane part left of herself.  
So she didn't know if she was really doing the right thing.

“I know how to finish the Gen 4 Synths.”  
Silence.  
Grace held her own breath, the noise made her restless. She had to hear his answer, loud and clear. She had to know that there was still a chance, that there was still hope.  
“How do I know you're telling the truth?”, Shaun questioned her, but the Vault Dweller had prepared herself for him to say that and nearly choked on her own spit, tripped over her own words shooting out her answer:  
“Because it's the only chance you have.”

That wasn't true. He had enough scientists who could figure it out eventually, but he didn't have the luxury of time. While they were talking down here the Brotherhood was fighting against their Synths for territory, for influence. They were close to taking them down. He needed a quick solution and she could give him this solution.

“It's like you said; I'm here to construct Synths, nothing more or less.”  
Shaun didn't show any reaction. The emotions coloring his face before were gone again and he had gone back to his calm, collected self.  
“Don't trust her, Father.” The scientist literally spit out the words in distrust. “She would say anything to safe her skin.”  
“I'm not saving my skin.”  
Grace breathed heavily and a much bigger part of her than she'd like to admit hoped Piper was hearing this and hoped Piper would appreciate it. It was selfish and maybe not the best way to getting her trust back, but her options were limited.

“I'm saving hers.”  
The Vault Dweller shot Piper a glance. Her face was still hard to read. Hurt, Discomfort, Disbelief. She couldn't say for sure.  
“Put her in the cells until I figure out what to do with her.”  
Shaun turned his back on her and left it to the Coursers to detain her. She didn't struggle. The fact he didn't decide to kill her right away was a miracle itself. The relief washed over her, made her shiver all over.

As the ex lovers were left alone with their thougths the both of them realized the freezing cold in their hearts. 

But there were no words to warm them up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One Chapter left. I know I said something about "Violence" in the warnings, I did this in advance for the last one, so ..


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I know I said I wanted to make this the last one, but I took too much time with the conversation stuff to sort things out and it would have become too long and yeah. Next one it is.

Being here with all the other prisoners made Grace feel even more lonely than her whole time she spend in the Institute overall as the unwanted outsider. Even with Piper right in the cell besides her own. 

At first she had been pacing around the small space she had restlessly. Everyone did the best to avoid her as good as possible, what she didn't take as a personal offense despite the same bad situation they all were in and the bars separating them, but it was still driving her nuts to have to listen to her own thoughts and voice, when she started talking to herself to block out the unpleasant noises surrounding her.   
Pipers activities weren't that much different from hers, their options were obviously pretty limited. The Vault Dweller watched her sleep sometimes, leaned her forehead against the barrier between them and wished things were still like they had been before.

Grace lost the feel for time pretty quick. She slept whenever she felt tired, ate whenever they decided to feed her and forced herself not to bash her head against the wall whenever the rage threatened to consume her. At least the toilets were clean and in a tiny room embedded in the wall to give them privacy.  
At one point the Vault Dweller was just exhausted. She had turned her back on the reporter, couldn't deal with the silence hanging over them like a thick blanket. They haven't had a conversation since their reunion. Her words were still clinging in her ears, burned in her mind, impossible to just push aside to concentrate on anything else. The fact that there was nothing to distract her from wrapping her mind around her broken relationship made it even worse.

I'm done with you.

She would give all the caps in her possession to hear her thoughts, to witness what was going on inside her mind. 

Grace was leaning against the bars separating the two women. Absentminded she let her head fall back against the cold hard steel to create some kind of a slow rhythm to keep her mind, her sanity, together. The noises the other prisoners caused turned the room in a beehive. A low hum echoed from the walls, voices speaking words she couldn't understand, the ugly coughing of the sick and the gagging on their own vomit of the very sick. The ones who would never see the Commonwealth again. The ones who would suffer and die down here, lost and forgotten.

A cold shiver crawled up Grace's spine. She had to come up with something, anything. She had prevented Shaun from dragging her out of here like a malfunctioned Synth, but had promised him something she wasn't willing to give. In that moment, while she feared for Pipers and her own life, she was positive to make a right, a good choice. Had even praised herself for coming up with that idea in the last second, but now she started to think it through there was a big lump in her throat. A dull pain started to grow in the back of her head.

There were still a lot of unknowns in her 'plan'. A lot of situations where everything could go utterly wrong. Just one person had to act like she hadn't expected them to and the both of them would go to hell.  
Grace in fact did not know how to finish the Gen 4 Synths. She had made dozens of tests on animals, mostly not to earn suspicion, to find a way to extract movement patterns for certain muscles in connection with emotions saved in the brain like they did with the memories, but it had been way too complex. A synthetic mind simply couldn't handle it. It couldn't properly connect and act on the given information, it always looked fake or the robotic human copies didn't respond to the data at all. The electronics overheated and even partially melted, had caused brownouts or even complete blackouts. 

But now she had claimed to have found a way and they would make her kill innocent people to test it. No more animals, she was sure of it. They were running out of time.  
Maybe they would choose the ones already doomed.   
Maybe they would choose the more healthy ones to have a better chance of success.   
Maybe they would choose Piper just to piss her off and to see if she was really prepared to sacrifice loved ones for the cause, to find a way to work around the promise they hadn't given her yet, but Grace was more than sure Shaun would come back. He was taking his time though. She couldn't even guess how much time had passed, she just had to wait for him to make his decision or hold more useless meetings with his bright scientists to discuss the topic or whatever he was doing.  
He would give his life for the cause, for the Institute, he wouldn't waste the chance to construct the perfect human being.  
It was hopeless. She had to think of something to get them out of this mess, before ..

“Damn it, will you stop this already?”  
Pipers voice snapped her out of it. The back of her head stopped hitting the bars, mostly because of her being surprised and her body basically froze in place and just now she realized the source of the throbbing pain.   
“Sorry”, was all Grace could answer, tracing a faint trail of blood on the otherwise clean ground with her fingertips instead, while a warm feeling washed over her. She started to wonder why the prisons were so way behind everything else in the Institute. Not even glass walls to separate the prisoners, but bars. Clean bars, sure, but still weird. Did the have something in mind with it? Or did they just not care to spend resources on something so trivial like prisons for lab rats? Ridiculous.

“Hey, are you even listening?”   
The Vault Dweller had let her mind wander again. Like she didn't even want to hear what Piper had to say, the wounds of her earlier words were still fresh. She feared there was more of it.  
“Not in particular.”  
A sigh. A body flopping to the ground behind her. She could feel the heat through the bars, as Piper leaned her back against them from the other side.   
Grace held her breath.

“I said, stop apologizing.”  
That was unexpected. To give her hands and mind something else to focus on than Pipers voice Grace started to fumble on the buttons on her Pipboy. She nearly had forgotten about it, she had barely used it down here, didn't have the need to. The peeping she drew from it while browsing through the data stored in there was kind of comforting.  
Cries echoed from the walls and the Coursers guarding them were distracted by a fight between some prisoners in the cells in the back. 

“So ..”, Piper started, “I guess you're really not a Synth then?”  
“What?”  
“They wouldn't have locked you up If you were.”  
There was a smart answer to that right on the tip of her tongue, but she decided this wasn't the time for jokes – and especially not the right topic to joke about.  
Another spin and a click of buttons and Grace reached a file on her Pipboy which was actually exactly what she needed right now. The device glitched on her briefly when she browsed past it.

“You remember the file of my old client I gave you?”, the former lawyer mumbled, still didn't quite trust her voice. It was hoarse.  
She cleared her throat.  
“From the one with the same name as you? Remember how I told you about how he tried to sue his neighbours and everyone else in his neighbourhood for the stupidest things?”  
“Richard Wright”, the reporter sighed and she heard her shifting, adjusting her position, like she didn't know what to do with her hands and everything else either. It was weird talking to her without looking her in the eyes and just listening to her words which had a weird soothing effect on her while focusing on some random spots on the ground.

“You could still be a Synth with her memories, you know.”  
Grace's mood dropped in an instant.  
“So that is what you still think?”  
“Actually, no, not after the talk you had with your .. son.”  
So she did follow their conversation. This was comforting and embarrassing at the same time.

“I'm uh .. sorry about that”, Piper tried to comfort her, “That must be hard.”  
She didn't even want to think about it. Maybe the trauma of finding her son in a position like this, him basically being her enemy the whole time, had caused her to go haywire and not trust Piper with any of the operations she had planned. Maybe she had been lying to herself and everything had a completely different reasons, but it didn't make much sense to think about this right now. Especially not since they were still trapped in this position and all of this still not being over.  
The Vault Dweller didn't quite know how to respond. The reporter never struck her like a resentful kind of person, but she still didn't expect her to be so calm about all that just now.   
If she was lucky not all hope was lost yet.

“And I'm sorry for nearly spitting on you, by the way.”  
She must have noticed Grace didn't want to talk about it.   
“It's alright, I deserved it.”  
“So it's true what he said?”  
“About what?”  
“All the people .. slaughtered. I can't even imagine.”  
“It's .. true, yes.”  
She had to admit her mistakes and stop finding excuses. There were no excuses.

“Why did you do that?”  
Piper sounded so hurt, so disappointed, Grace had to bite her lip to stop herself from whimpering. It caused her pure pain just to listen to her voice coloured with this kind of emotions, so she was actually kind of glad she couldn't see her face.  
“You're making it like really hard to not believe you're one of them.”  
“I didn't want to”, the Vault Dweller responded, carefully chose her words,“I thought I could save him if I just .. kind of did what he asked me to, tried to lead him the right way, turn this whole organization around, I'm his mother after all.”

A sigh escaped her lips and absentminded Grace wiped some ugly stains from her Pipboys screen. It was the best to finally play with open cards.  
“But he is sick. He'll never back off from his plans. I really tried and look where it got me.”  
She held her breath for a second.  
“I never touched any of these people myself. I know this is no excuse, I still tolerated it and let it happen, like I basically wielded the knife myself, but I feel really bad about it. I didn't help him develop anything and that's not what I have in mind either.”

For a long time the reporter didn't answer. At first she thought she wouldn't continue the conversation at all, already prepared herself for a rude comment, prepared her mind and heart to be crushed again in an instant, but it didn't happen.  
“So that was what you had in mind all along? That was what you wouldn't tell me back then?”  
“Yes.”  
“Why? Why did you let me think you had betrayed me?”  
“I didn't want to drag you into this shit. I didn't .. want you to get hurt.”  
Suddenly she felt a hard shove between her shoulder blades, that left her gasping for air. 

“You have to be kidding me!”  
Piper was furious. She had all the right to be. But she had raised her voice at the words she had expected less.  
Slowly Grace turned her head and allowed herself to shoot her ex girlfriend a glance. Her cheeks were painted red in anger, she stood up and had her arm raised like she didn't know where to put and what to do with them.  
The Vault Dweller couldn't stop thinking about how beautiful and beautifully wild she looked at that moment. The bruises and cuts the Synths had left on her face when they took her were hard to miss though and reminded her of what she had to go through. While she claimed to protect her, sitting in her secure in warm shelter, she had been going through a rough time.

“Stop treating me like a baby, Grace!”, Piper vented her anger, “I don't need to be protected like a fragile doll, I'm a grown ass woman, I can take care of myself! I have raised Nat basically on my own for years while fighting off Ghouls, Raiders, Super Mutants and dumb want-to-be politicians!”  
Frustrated she bashed her fists against the bars which led the Vault Dweller to jolt out of her position and back to her feet, watched the woman curse and rage, tried to catch her breath.  
“And you didn't think I at least deserved to know if you already didn't want me to join you? What are you so scared of?”

Silence.

There was this tension between them. The situation just needed another spark to fire up again, but that wasn't what Grace had in mind. She wanted to calm her down.  
She took a deep shaky breath.  
“I'm scared of ending up alone again”, she whispered and Pipers shoulders dropped, “First Nate, then Shaun, I didn't want you to be next. I didn't want to fail anyone again. I'm sorry.”

“Listen to me.”  
The reporter closed the distance between herself and the bars, grabbed the cold metal and focused on her through the gaps. Grace was mesmerized.  
“I am not helpless. Stop acting like I depend on you as my protector to survive. You understand?”  
Tears were burning in the Vault Dwellers eyes and she nodded quietly, didn't trust her own voice anymore. She felt like a child being scolded by her mother. But she had needed that. The information, the things Piper pointed out, were finally pushing through to her completely for her mind to progress. Everything was less clouded. She was right. Again. Of course she was right.  
She was relieved the reporter had calmed down, had put aside her rage and decided to talk with her about what was on her mind instead of judging her based on assumptions.

But she was still calling her 'Grace'.

Even if it had gotten better it would still take her a lot of time and work to build the trust between them back up to how it had been. Like putting the air back to into a flat balloon. Like turning on every light again after a blackout. Like-  
Wait.

“Blackout.”

“What?”  
“A blackout, Piper, that's it!”  
Excited the Vault Dweller started pacing around her cell, wrapped her mind around the flash of wit she just had. If she could manage to get them to let them out of the cells, if she could get her hands on the machine she had worked with during the tests she had made with the animals, she could - 

“Stop speaking in puzzles”, Piper complained and crossed the arms in front of her chest. It was still weird seeing her without her hat, but Grace didn't have the time to admire the view. She was too busy to work out the details.  
“Just trust me with this, alright?”  
The reporters face darkened.

“You're not just getting my trust back”, she stated, “You have to earn it.”

Grace rapidly stopped in her pacing. She just realized what exactly she said.   
The same thing she had wanted to make Piper promise before she left for her mission in the Institute.   
Where everything between them had gone to hell.   
While she still had the faith to change her sons mind.   
Instantly the regret caused her guts to cramp. She had promised to change. She couldn't always shut her out. Especially where the both of them were involved in this.   
Especially where Piper was playing a huge role in her plan. 

“You're right, you don't have to trust me.”  
The Vault Dweller closed the distance between them, just the bars were still separating them.

“But I trust you. And I need your help, I can't do this on my own. So listen closely.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Pipers part "You're not just getting my trust back" is actually from when she breaks up with you ingame and I was just like "shit" when I heard that the first time. It just fit. Now that they have that sorted out they can start the outbreak


End file.
